Re:What America looked like before the EPA, in photos
by lmm on Friday March 16, 2018 @05:51AM
(#16599599)
> Imbued in your statement is an even more difficult knot to undo. "Tragedy of the Commons" is caused by the very existence of the modern state.
> Common land = public land. In a truly private system, one in which all land was owned, every parcel of land would have some advocate who cared very deeply about the environmental quality of their land.
The state is the entity that owns all land - prior to states land was simply not owned - and state organs like the EPA are the advocates who care deeply about the environmental quality of public land.
You can't address environmental issues on a smaller scale - indeed even individual states are too small a scale be able to address inherently global problems like CO2 emissions. Any "private" owner of the entire planet, or even of a large enough region to address issues like fishery management or water table pollution, would have to function like a state and share the same problems (e.g. lack of competing alternatives).
> Common land = public land. In a truly private system, one in which all land was owned, every parcel of land would have some advocate who cared very deeply about the environmental quality of their land.
The state is the entity that owns all land - prior to states land was simply not owned - and state organs like the EPA are the advocates who care deeply about the environmental quality of public land.
You can't address environmental issues on a smaller scale - indeed even individual states are too small a scale be able to address inherently global problems like CO2 emissions. Any "private" owner of the entire planet, or even of a large enough region to address issues like fishery management or water table pollution, would have to function like a state and share the same problems (e.g. lack of competing alternatives).